Semmelweis tirelessly experiments with a cure for the scourge of European hospitals—mothers dying of infection after childbirth. Swept up in the 19th century revolutionary spirit, he concocts a radical solution: doctors washing their hands! His solution indicts doctors as the cause and leads to his ridicule by the medical establishment. He returns to Budapest where he fights successfully to change practices in local hospitals. He goes crazy trying to convince the larger medical community to wash. His story is a tragic one of speaking truth to power. While he fails globally, he succeeds in saving thousands of mothers' lives.